Liverpool Have Best Chance Of Champions League Progress

Liverpool, City, United To Go Through, Spurs To Go Out Predicts Data Analyst

Liverpool are the most likely Premier League club to progress out of the group stages of the Champions League this season. That’s according to data analysed by Gracenote Sports.

The Merseyside club have an 81 percent chance of making it to the knockout stages from a group that includes Sevilla, Spartak Moscow and Maribor having had a 51 percent chance before the draw for the group stages was made.

Manchester City and Manchester United are both given a 73 percent chance of making it into the last 16 while Chelsea are rated at 66 percent.

But Gracenote believe that being drawn in a group that includes Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund will be too much for Tottenham Hotspur. They put Spurs’ chances of making it to the last 16 at just 48 percent.

Celtic are given just a 4 percent chance of getting out of a group containing Bayern Munich, Paris Saint-Germain and Anderlecht. The Scottish champions were rated at 11 percent before the draw was made.

As expected, Europe’s real powerhouses are given the best chances of progressing by Gracenote. Real Madrid, Barcelona and Bayern Munich are given a probability of 97 percent. PSG are given 93 percent, Juventus 88 percent and Atletico Madrid 85 percent.

La Liga side Sevilla are given a better chance than Liverpool of making it out of their group on 84 percent with Monaco on 83 percent.

Gracenote uses its European clubs ranking table, the Euro Club Index, as part of its calculations. It then simulates each group match 1million times to predict the results and, ultimately, who will progress.

Last season, the company correctly predicted 15 of the 16 clubs to progress to the Champions League knockout phase, along with 27 of the 32 from the Europa League.

Arsenal have been given the best chance of qualifying from Europe’s secondary competition on 96 percent. Their group contains Cologne, BATE Borisov and Red Star Belgrade. Everton have a 67 percent chance of progressing. But Gracenote’s head of analysis Simon Gleave believes there is a 60 percent chance that the eventual winners of this season’s Europa League will be one of the clubs dropping down from the Champions League.

“There is more chance of a team currently not in the Europa League winning it than one of the 48 starting the competition,” said Gleave.

“Eight of the top 12 most likely Europa League winners this season start in the Champions League.

“Of those eight, Borussia Dortmund or Tottenham Hotspur are most favoured to pull this off as both have a high chance of finishing third in Champions League Group H and therefore switching to the Europa League.”